We've been a little quiet for the last week as we've put the finishing touches on the Heavy update. We thought the Pyro pack was the biggest we'd be doing for a while, due to the large changes to the Pyro, but the Heavy update has turned out to be even bigger. In addition to the three unlockable weapons and thirty-five achievements for the Heavy, we've got a new game mode with five new maps for it, a new Payload map focusing on more open spaces than Goldrush, and another popular community-made map. Throughout the rest of the week we'll be giving you the details on all this, and if all goes well, you'll have your hands on it shortly afterwards.

The community-made map included in the Heavy update is cp_steel, by Jamie 'Fishbus' Manson. After the Pyro update we received a lot of email telling us how wrong we were in our choices, and cp_steel was an easy next choice due to the way it dominated the suggestions. If you're firing up your email right now to tell us that we never get anything right, please include suggestions of what map(s) we should be looking at next.

We'll be updating A Heavy Update site with more info daily. Stay tuned!

What? Huh? How the hell can they suddenly have made fricking SIX new maps? This absolutely blows away my expectations.

It's been a while since I've been this excited. Since the week before Gold Rush, to be exact.

...Just to be picky, they never said that it will be released on Aug 19th. They'll give us more throughout the week (until Tuesday I guess, which is the 19th), and after that they'll release it if all goes well. I'd say around 1st-10th September.

My guess? Then new game mode is something based on what we heard earlier, that their research showed that the people who liked tc_hydro were the ones that liked Sudden Death, and they were considering making a game mode based on it. So I'm guessing we'll get smaller maps for an "arena" gametype that implements that mechanic somehow.

Edit: Somebody found an "arena" gametype thing about the HUD (I don't remember what exactly) in the existing gamecode, and the phrasing "a new game mode with five new arenas for it" rather than "five new maps for it" seems to suggest that, though I may be making something out of nothing.

I'm guessing for the maps:
Hunted, Another Custom map, A Payload map that incorporates a large platform, and some TFC ports.

Click to expand...

Something tells me you forgot to read it properly.

we've got a new game mode with five newarenas for it, a new Payload map focusing on more open spaces than Goldrush, and another popular community-made map.

Click to expand...

So, that means no Hunted (it's not a new game mode) no "another custom map" (we've already got Steel, and they're saying it will be one), no Payload on a large platform and...probably not any TFC ports.

With six new maps coming, I'm sure at least on of them will be in a new environment. Valve have made lots of variations on their mining/desert/industry themes, but I think even they have to run out of possibilities some time.